Factors Affecting Job Performance among Polytechnic Academic Staff
Muhamad Saufiyudin Omar1*, Shahrizal Ahmad Selo2, Nurhidayah Rafie3
1 Department of Tourism & Hospitality, Politeknik Tuanku Syed Sirajuddin, Pauh Putra, 02600 Arau, Perlis, Malaysia.
2 Department of Tourism & Hospitality, Politeknik Merlimau (PMM), Karung Berkumci 1031, Pejabat Pos, 77300. Melaka Malaysia.
3 Department of Tourism & Hospitality, Politeknik METrO Kuantan, No. A-5, Jalan Tun Ismail 2, Sri Dagangan 11, 25000 Kuantan, Pahang Malaysia.
*Corresponding Author: saufiyudin@yahoo.com
Accepted: 1 November 2020 | Published: 15 November 2020
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Abstract: Staff’ performance is critically important to ensure the success of the organization.
Therefore, the purpose of this study is to examine the factors that affected job performance among polytechnic academic staff in Malaysia. The cross-sectional study was employed and stratified random sampling was used to collect the data. A total of 130 respondents answered the questionnaires. The result reveals that achievement, recognition and the work itself are significantly and positively influence job performance. Therefore, this study suggests that enhancing the elements of achievement, recognition and the work itself among polytechnic academic staff are critically important in order to improve their performance. More detailed about findings and implications are discussed.
Keywords: achievement, job performance, recognition, work itself
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1. Introduction
Job performance is the key to measure the successful of the staff and the organization. It also determined whether the organization is in the stage of improvement, deterioration or stagnancy (Boyne, Farrell, Law, Powell, & Walker, 2003). Therefore, measuring the staff’s job performance is important for the organization to continue to survive. There are many factors that influence job performance amongst the staff namely achievement, recognition and the work itself. According to Popoola and Farukuoye (2017) achievements can influence the way a person performs their tasks and shows competency. Thus, achievement plays an important role in influencing the job performance. Other than achievement, the recognition also plays a vital role in influencing the job performance. As stated by Hussain, Khaliq, Nisar, Kamboh and Ali (2019) that staff usually wish for good compensation packages but they also want to be recognized by their superiors. Hence, recognition could also increase the staffs’ performance and at the same time could improve their morale (Hussian et al., 2019).
Besides that, the work itself is also one of the factors that increase the staffs’ performance. As mentioned by Plunkett and Attner (1989) the work itself is the opportunity for self- expression, individual fulfilment and overcoming challenges for the employees. Therefore, aforementioned above, all of these factors such as the staffs’ achievement, recognition and the work itself must be emphasized by the management as it could influence the staffs’
performance including in the context of Polytechnic staff.
In light of this, Polytechnic Malaysia is recognized as one of the hubs for the nation’s human capital development (Jaafar, 2013). Its role has been expanded and its establishment has been re-branded in making sure the nation’s missions are accomplished by providing the human capital source to the industrial sectors in order to generate the economic growth (Jabatan Pengajian Politeknik, 2009). Furthermore, Polytechnic Malaysia focused on the skill-based subjects especially related to technical and vocational education and training (TVET) that have been improvised and improved in order to be in line with the national plan in achieving Vision 2020 (Abdullah & Majid, 2013). Hence, the study on human capital especially the teaching staff re critically important due to the high demand and challenges faced by the polytechnic lecturers in teaching the targeted skills to the future nation.
One of the challenges faced by most of polytechnic staff is carrying heavy workload.
They are not only involved in educating students, but also to carry out various management tasks that may lead to dissatisfaction and consequently affect their performance.
In addition, the staff also need to multitask, switching between the academic and non- academic tasks to ensure the organization could run smoothly. As mentioned by Kalleberg (1977) an employee may be satisfied with one or some of the job responsibilities he or she has but dissatisfied with the other tasks on hand. Hence, it could affect the performance of the staff themselves.
Many researches have done on the topic on achievement, recognition and the work itself with job performance. However, the studies that combined all these factors into one research is very limited (Clarke & Mahadi, 2015; Hussian et al., 2019; Popoola & Farukuoye, 2017). On top of that, limited studies that focuses on polytechnic staffs’ human capital, has created a gab for the present study. Hence, the purpose of this present study are (1) to examine the relationship between staffs’ achievement and job performance, (2) to investigate the relationship between staffs’ recognition and job performance and (3) to assess the relationship between the work itself and job performance. The finding of this study will help the management especially polytechnic’ head of department (HoD) to improve and enhance staffs’ performance through the factors of achievement, recognition and the work itself.
2. Literature Review
Achievement
Staff’s achievement is one of the factors that could motivate and increase staffs’ performance (Acquah, 2017). This is because most staff would want to achieve something over their lifetime as a result of experiences in a career or in their own personal life (McClelland, 1985).
Staff’ achievement could be defined as the extent to which individuals differ in their needs to strive to attain rewards, such as physical satisfaction, praise from others and feelings of personal mastery (McClelland, 1985). On the other hand, staffs who enter an organization have various needs; some have high needs and some have low needs, and some have needs through achievement, power and affiliation as these are reflected in their behaviours at the initial stage of their recruitment (Popoola & Farukuoye, 2017). Therefore, it is believed that in order to motivate the employees, the superiors must understand the employees’ need of achievement (Acquah, 2017). In light of this the achievement of the Polytechnic staff is critically important. Besides motivating the staff, it also helps to increase their performance.
Recognition
Expressing recognition for a job well done to the staff is the top motivator of employee performance (Bradler, Dur, Neckermann & Non, 2016). Grant and Gino (2010) stated that a
manager’s verbal expression of gratitude affects employees’ effort and find strong positive effects for the employees themselves. In addition, when employees received recognition from their managers, subsequent performance increases as compared to those who did not received the recognition (Bradler et al., 2016). Employee’s recognition could be seen as a form of positive feedback in strengthening the employee’s behaviour and enhancing employee`s performance (Mone et al., 2011). It is also not just related to the psychological need of the individual, but should also be seen as an organizational and human resource management tool to improve employees (Masri & Abubakr, 2019). Therefore, this showed that recognition plays a vital role in improving employee’s performance.
Work itself
According to Castillo and Cano (2004) the work itself is the content of the job that employee needs to perform. When asking the employees to evaluate the characteristics of the job, usually the employee will say the job itself is heavy and the weight is high (Raza, Akhtar, Husnain, & Akhtar, 2015). Therefore, managers should conduct a job analysis for each position and seek innovative ways to enhance the work (Castillo & Cano, 2004). Individual is extrinsically motivated when they are engaged in the work to obtain something that is part from the work itself. The work itself is the most motivating factors as usually a satisfied employee with the work itself will perform better.
Job performance
Job performance is defined as the amount of value expected from the organization based on discrete behaviour performed by individuals (workers) within a specified period of time (Motowidlo, 2003). In other words, job performance is all behaviours that workers engaged at work (Jex, 2002). Job performance is important because it measures the effectiveness of individual workers (Mohamad & Jais, 2016). It also acts as the main role in most personnel decisions such as merit-based payment, promotion and retention of workers (Scullen, Mount
& Goff, 2000). Hence, portraying best performance among the workers is critically important. It is not only for the workers but it also determines the success of the organization.
Conceptual framework
Based on Figure 1, the independent variables are achievement, recognition and work itself, while the dependent variable is job performance. Based on the framework, this study proposed four hypotheses as followed:
Hypothesis 1: Achievement positively influence job performance.
Hypothesis 2: Recognition positively influence job performance.
Hypothesis 3: Work itself positively influence job performance.
Figure 1: Conceptual framework of the study H3
H2
Achievement H1
Recognition Work itself
Job performance
3. Methodology
This study employed a quantitative approach with a survey method in order to collect data.
The population of this research comprised of individuals who work at the Department of Tourism and Hospitality at Polytechnic Malaysia as lecturers. They are government servants and mostly have been working more than six years.
In terms of questionnaire, the study has adapted a number of instruments from previous studies and researchers. For instance, instrument for achievement is adapted from Teck-Hong and Waheed (2011), instrument for recognition and work itself is adapted from Smerek &
Peterson (2007) and job performance from Koopmans (2014). In order to make it suitable to the study, some modifications were made to the questionnaire. The questionnaire was divided into six parts; Part A: Demographic profile (7 items), Part B: achievement (5 items), Part C:
recognition (5 items), Part D: work itself (5 items), and Part E: job performance (19 items). A five point Likert scale was employed ranging from ‘1-strongly disagree’ to ‘5-strongly agree’
to measure all variables and SPSS was utilized to analyse the data.
In terms of data collection, the questionnaire started with a note from the researchers to inform the respondents pertaining to the study’s objectives that all data gathered will be treated as confidential. In addition, the respondents are also informed that the questionnaire will take approximately about 15 minutes to be completed. The questionnaire is personally self-administered and the involvements of the respondents are at voluntary basis. Stratified random sampling was used to determine the selection of the respondents.
4. Data Analysis and Results
Respondents demographic
Out of 169 samples, only 130 responded on the survey and gave a response rate of 77%. The results revealed that more female employees (74.6%) answered the questionnaire compared to male employees (25.4%). : The respondents that were of age between 31-40 years old has the highest percentage ( 69.2%) in answering, followed by 41-50 years old (25.4%) and the lowest were between 51-60 years old (0.8%). The majority of the respondents were Malay (99.2%) and the other race was 0.8%. in terms of job tenure, most of the respondents have been working for 11-15 years (44.6%), followed by 6-10 years (32.3%) and 15 years and above (13.8%). In this study, employees from Politeknik Tuanku Syed Sirajuddin (39 employees) and Politeknik Sultan Idris Shah (39 employees) were the highest respondents, followed by Politeknik Merlimau Melaka with 36 employees (27.7%) and lastly, Politeknik Metro Kuantan with 16 employees (12.3%). Table 1 showed the demographic profile of the respondents.
Table 1: Demographic profile of respondents
Demographic variables Category Frequency Percentage (%)
Gender Male 33 25.4
Female 97 74.6
Age 21 – 30 years old 6 4.6
31 – 40 years old 90 69.2 41 – 50 years old 33 25.4
51 – 60 years old 1 .8
Race Malay 129 99.2
Others 1 .8
Job Tenure 1-5 years 12 9.2
6-10 years 42 32.3
11-15 years 58 44.6
15 years and above 18 13.8
Polytechnics PTSS 39 30.0
PSIS 39 30.0
PMKu 16 12.3
PMM 36 27.7
Reliability
The reliability results in Table 2, showed the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of achievement, recognition, work itself and job performance. Based on the findings, achievement, recognition and work itself indicated the value of more than 0.70. According to Sekaran and Bougie (2013) Cronbach’s alpha coefficient value of 0.70 is considering good. Therefore, this study in term of reliability considered reliable.
Table 2: Reliability results
Variables Cronbach’s alpha coefficient value
Achievement 0.736
Recognition 0.760
Work itself 0.781
Job performance 0.804
Correlation analysis
The Pearson correlation showed the correlation of achievement, recognition, work itself and job performance. The results indicated positive relationships between achievement, recognition, work itself and job satisfaction with r = 0.234, r = 0.466, r = 0.449 respectively.
Based on the findings, the strongest positive correlation on job satisfaction was recognition followed by work itself and lastly achievement. Table 3 showed the correlation analysis of the study.
Table 3: Correlation analysis of study
Variables Achievement Recognition Work itself Job performance Achievement
Recognition .532**
Work itself .736** .483**
Job performance .234** .466** .449**
**Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed)
Multiple regression analysis
The multiple regression analysis was used to analyse the factors that influence employee performance. Based on the results, it indicated that R2 = 0.316, which means all the factors explain 31.6% of the variance in the employee performance with F = 19.369, p = 0.000. The remaining of 68.4% explained by the other factors. In light of this achievement, recognition and work itself contributed significantly and positively towards the prediction of employee’
performance with the beta values of 0.158, 0.332 and 0.276 respectively. Hence, Hypothesis 1, Hypothesis 2 and Hypothesis 3 were supported. This implied that achievement, recognition and work itself influenced employees’ performance in the context of Polytechnic employees.
Table 4 showed the results of Multiple regression analysis of the study.
Table 4: Multiple regression analysis
Model B SE B t Sig.
(Constant) 1.329 .407 3.262 .001 Achievement .188 .089 .158 2.108 .037 Recognition .258 .064 .332 4.047 .000 Work itself .223 .067 .276 3.330 .001
Note: R2 = 0.316, p 0.000.
5. Discussions
The main objective of this study was to examine the influence between achievement, recognition, work itself and job performance among polytechnic staff. Based on the empirical findings generated, the results indicated that achievement, recognition and work itself had significant and positive influence on job performance. These findings were aligned with previous studies of Popoola and Farukuoye (2017) that found there was a significant relationship between achievement and job performance among workers. Hussain et al., (2019) also found that recognition has a significant and positive effect on employee performance. While, Ryan and Deci (2000) also found when the employees enjoy with the work itself, their performances were getting higher. These showed that employees’
achievement, recognition, work itself played important roles in determining overall employees’ job performance among polytechnic workers.
In this study, there are many factors that influenced the significant and positive relationships between achievement, recognition, work itself and job performance of the polytechnic workers. From the findings obtained, most of the staff agreed that they enjoyed the type of work they did so far. In addition, the jobs that they have currently are interesting and gave them a sense of accomplishment. The staff also felt that they have contributed to the organization in a positive way. Consequently, this has contributed to the positive finding in this study.
Besides that, the finding also showed that, most of the staff has successfully accomplished difficult assignment given by their superiors. Hence, it has created a sense of satisfaction in their jobs and therefore gave them feeling of accomplishment. The staff also always expressed gratitude and appreciation to other staff in the organization, consequently increased the performance of the staff.
6. Conclusion and Recommendations
In a nutshell this study found that achievement, recognition and work itself have significant and positive influenced on job performance amongst the Polytechnic staff. The findings also suggested that staff of Department of Tourism and Hospitality agreed that these three factors (achievement, recognition and work itself) played vital roles in improving their performances. Hence, enhancing these three factors were important for the management to focus on.
A few limitations were found in this study that need to be considered for future research since the results of the study showed there were other factors that influenced staff performance besides achievement, recognition and work itself. Therefore, this study would like to suggest to include job motivation, job involvement, organization commitment and employee attitudes for future research. Secondly, this study focused on Department of Tourism and Hospitality
workers only and perhaps in the future could include other departments such as Electrical Engineering Department, Mechanical Engineering Department, Information Technology and Communication Department, and Commerce Department. Lastly, this study focussed on the lecturers only and perhaps in the future it could include the management and non- management workers as well.
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